France needs its own No Kings day to protect its most valuable treasure | Patrick Boucheron and Pierre Singaravélou

We have no crown jewels: the Louvre panic is a distraction from the real threat the far right poses to our democracy According to some international commentators – and France’s perpetually doomsaying conservatives – the break-in at the Louvre was much more than a burglary; it was the latest chapter in a grand narrative of national collapse. Never mind that it was probably carried out by a couple of chancers with a crowbar: for some of the pessimists, it’s civilisation itself that’s being prised open. Funny how the same people who decry France’s alleged dysfunctionalism probably marvelled at the Paris Olympics of summer 2024 – that brief, dazzling interlude when the city actually worked, the trains ran on time, and millions around the world fell a little bit in love with France again. Patrick Boucheron is a French historian and author, and professor of history at the Collège de France; Pierre Singaravélou is professor of history at the Université Paris 1 Panthéon- Sorbonne.